


'Of Two Lesser Evils'

by DreamSmithAJK



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Buffy is a Bitch, F/F, Faith loves Buffy, Femme Buffy, Lesbians in Space
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-04
Updated: 2015-10-04
Packaged: 2018-04-24 18:14:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4930027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DreamSmithAJK/pseuds/DreamSmithAJK
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Farmboy from Tattooine holds the key to defeating the Empire... but what REALLY matters are a pair of criminals named Buffee and Faehth who are looking for their next big score.</p>
            </blockquote>





	'Of Two Lesser Evils'

Disclaimer: As always, I acknowledge the hard work and creativity of the original creators of these works. Since this is a reworking of a specific block of a movie, more than the usual number of repurposed dialogue bits appear here. Those fragments of the movie dialogue are not mine, and are now and forever the property of the writers of these legendary films. Whedon, Lucas, Fox and the other Fox are probably all tangled up in there, so acknowledgments are offered to all!

Once again, I wish to thank these special people, for helping me to do what I love. Thank you so much, kind and gentle friends.  
Charles Jackson, David Helmink, Janessa Ravenwood, Lilane Assous, Christopher, Visitant Sierra, Chris Ellis, Rickard, Paul Millsted, Michael Cronin, Jeffrey Clemons, Dale, Ethan Barton, Ken Hagler, Wil, Brandon Young, Andy Rowell, Maracel, Jessamyn Howe, Lauren Cash

Very Long Author's Note, GO:  
This will be an Anthology piece, based loosely on a few other stories I've done called [Parallels], which is a thing where I look at different alternate worlds that each have a Faith and a Buffy, and in every such world the two of them are in love (because those worlds are precious and dear to me).  
Now, this cluster of stories will be slightly different. These are still alternate universes, parallel worlds, and Buffy and Faith are still always there, but these worlds are maybe a little darker, a little dingier, a little rusty and mean.  
These are worlds where not only are these two not glorious heroes, they're not even terrifying villains.  
These are the worlds where Buffy and Faith are content to be... thugs. Minions. Hired muscle. Because sometimes it's the things that happen down on the smaller scale that are the most interesting.  
Sometimes you don't fight to take over the galaxy, or the world, but just to keep hold of a neighborhood, or a street, or your life, for one more night.  
And of course, even awful, petty criminals have hopes and dreams for a better life, and wish desperately to love and be loved in turn.  
So let's take a little time and see what those worlds look like.

Much Shorter Author's Note:  
If its been a while since you saw Star Wars: A New Hope, this video refresher might be helpful, before you get too far into this chapter.  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6PDcBhODqo

 

"Far, Far Away"  
(Part One)

The cantina was a squalid hole; even Mos Eisley had better places, if what you were actually looking for was a decent place to drink. On the other hand, if you were a thief or grifter, slicer or thug, and were willing to do absolutely anything for a few credits, then this was exactly the sort of place you would go to make connections and maybe find some work.

And of course you could _also_ still have yourself a drink or two, so long as you didn't mind the grit and grime that coated nearly every surface, the crowd of ugly, foul-smelling customers, or the swirling, screeching noises being produced by the 'musicians' over on the slightly elevated stage.

As for Buffee Sohmerrs, she _did_ mind all of those things; she minded them _intensely_ , almost as much as she resented the necessity of being in such an establishment in the first place. For someone who had been born into wealth and privilege, whose entire _world_ had been a quiet place of gentle beauty, softness and elegance, the ugly, filthy _din_ of the cantina was nearly unbearable. 

Standing at one end of the bar, she sighed impatiently as the grotesque (though mercifully human) barman took a significant fraction of forever to even take her order, much less prepare her drinks. The general stench of the place also seemed, if anything, even stronger here; she tried to breathe shallowly, holding herself straight and, refusing to let the rabble see how greatly their proximity discomfited her. If she had been possessed of Force abilities she would have used them to hold the unclean masses at bay, but alas, even her magnificent bloodline lacked those gifts.

Even so, her confidence, nobility, and innate superiority combined to create a presence that was more than sufficient to maintain a small bubble of personal space around her... until some ridiculous little bat-like creature in a white vest scurried past, whining for a refill and treading upon her toes with its filthy little footpads.

Buffee endured this latest assault upon her dignity with strained, brittle calm. During the last few months she'd simply had to accept the fact that her family's guards were no longer standing ready to seize such offenders and flog them mercilessly for her satisfaction... darn it.

  
* * * * *  


Luke had never felt so out of place in his life.

Hovering awkwardly near the bar, he sipped at his drink and waited to see where this latest phase of his journey would take him. Ben was close by, speaking discreetly with first a greasy-skinned humanoid amphibian,then a standard human spacer, asking about hiring transport out of the Tattooine system. 

The drink Luke had bought a minute earlier had been a disappointment; there was a foul aftertaste to it that reminded him of industrial-strength engine de-greaser. He sipped at it anyway, since no one else seemed to be complaining.

Then he happened to turn, idly watching the surly man behind the bar as he took another patron's order... and nearly choked on the foul-tasting drink.

_She's beautiful--_ That was his first thought, which was true so far as it went, but there was far more to it than that. Up until now he'd thought the girl in Artoo's message was beautiful too, but she had just been knocked down four or five rungs, to somewhere around 'reasonably pretty'. 

Because if the word 'beautiful' applied to _anything_ in the entire known galaxy, it was the girl standing three meters further down the bar.

Tiny and delicate, she seemed almost to glow in the smoky dimness; her porcelain skin, pale gold hair, and alabaster dress of silk and lace making her seem even more unreal than the hologram that had set him on this adventure.

Luke stared; he couldn't have _not_ stared if his life depended on it, and with every passing moment he became more entranced. The girl--or young woman, for she was about his own age--wasn't simply beautiful; she was perfect. As in, 'literally, impossibly perfect', to a degree which was nearly surreal. Every centimeter of her face, each graceful curve of her form, every detail down to the dozens of tiny ribbons tied into her knee-length hair, and the long nails adorning her soft, pale hands was utterly without flaw. 

Nothing in Luke's sharply limited experience had prepared him for such a sight; she was like a sculptor's masterpiece come to life, or a magical being from a child's fairytale, that had stepped into the tired ugliness of Mos Eisley. 

She seemed to feel his gaze, and with studied elegance she turned her head and regarded him, and he was captivated again by those huge, drowning-deep eyes of crystalline green. He held his breath for that instant, and managed a hesitant smile... and her perfect, pouting lips twisted ever-so-slightly in annoyance, those eyes dismissing him even as she turned away with regal hauteur to watch her drinks being made.

Luke, being a young man, and having a young man's prickly pride, felt a flash of anger and indignation at that instant rejection. His admiring gaze became a glare, and it only got worse as the girl smiled with faint amusement; never glancing back at him, yet seeming somehow aware of his anger, and taking considerable pleasure from it.

From close by he heard heard a rough guffaw.

“Don't be shocked, boy! There's no one in this place who'd suit her royal snootiness over there!”

He gave a start and looked around. Ben was further down the bar now, speaking quietly with a towering Wookie. The being who had spoken to him wasn't so tall as that, but he still had 15 centimeters on Luke, though his knowing grin removed much of the wariness that his orange skin, cat-like ears and talon-tipped fingers would have otherwise inspired in the young farmer.

“Huh?” Luke felt himself flush with embarrassment. “I mean, that girl is royal?”

The catman nodded, though his shoulders rose and his large hands spread in a shrug as well.

“Maybe not _royal_ , but 'noble' for dead certain, surely.” His eyes flicked past Luke, to where the girl still stood.

“The look's a right giveaway, y'see. Them Core-worlder families, the ones that own whole planets--they gene-slice themselves.” He looked back down at the younger man. “After all, iffin' they're richer than everybody else, and thera-fore _better_ than everybody else, they figure they might as well be _prettier_ than everybody else too, right-so?”

Luke nodded, vaguely surprised someone in this place was willing to speak to him in so genial a fashion, but mostly he was intrigued by what he was hearing. 

“So they change themselves just for better _looks?_ ”

The big orange felinoid grinned, showing small, sharp fangs.

“That, surely, only also they mos'ly don't get sick from things, neither, an's they live to a ripe ol' ages too--mebbe two or even three hunnerd years, so's I hear tell.” 

He reached out and gently patted Luke on the shoulder. 

“So don'ts feel sorry for yourself 'bout bein' judged and found wantin', little man. Ain't nobody here worthy to breathe her _air_ , to her thinkin', much less speak to her, or lay a single finger on her precious, perfect self.”

He left then, heading towards the steps that led up out out to the street, leaving Luke to ponder his words.

_Ben told me a little about the person in the recording, the Alderannian Princess, but he never mentioned anything about this. She's one of the Core world nobility too. I wonder if she's as full of herself as_ this _one_.

Unable to resist the urge, he glanced over at the gorgeous blonde girl again... only to find that she'd gotten her drinks and was now moving away, towards the far side of the dimly lit space. Despite her off-putting manner, the young man found himself unable to look away from the graceful swaying of that slender form, and when his view was blocked by another humanoid he grimaced in annoyance, trying to edge past so he could keep the lovely girl in sight a few seconds longer--

The being directly before him shifted suddenly, nearly knocking Luke down, and when he recovered his balance it was to find a decidedly unfriendly, walrus-like face leering into his own.

  
* * * * *  


There was some kind of noise and bluster from behind her, but Buffee ignored it.

_Probably that farmboy, mooning after me, or some drunk starting a fight because they're too worthless and stupid to do anything else._

She made her way towards the booths in the back corner, trying to shut out the insufferable screeching of the creatures on the stage, and failing.

_Sacred Stars, I want off this filthy, sweaty, sandy rock! All these gross aliens being all alien-ey, and every dirt-farmer and greasy mechanic pawing at me, presuming to imagine they could be with me...._

Her head dropped slightly, even as she wound her way through the scattering of tables, choosing a path that kept her as far away from anything non-human as possible.

The depression came surging back, always ready to pounce whenever it saw an opening.

Because she knew; despite all her bluster, despite her poses and pretenses, Buffee _knew_ how far she had fallen. She knew that in her own way, _she_ was as pathetic as the rest of the vermin that infested this town. 

Yes, she had been born into the noble house of Sohmerrs, the House of the Summer Stars, but that no longer mattered. She was cast out, cut off, and exiled, and the pampered, sheltered life she'd led for her first sixteen years had left her ill-equipped for the galaxy outside.

There was a muffled, somehow electronic hiss from back in the bar area, and few shouts of pain or surprise... and she absolutely did not care about whatever tawdry drama might be unfolding among the drunks and burnouts. More tragic by far was the fact that half her fingers were utterly bereft of rings, that her slender wrists were nearly naked of glittering bangles, that there was a faintly visible _smudge_ on the ivory lace of her exquisitely beautiful gown... that she was _carrying her own drinks_ , like a common barmaid!

Reaching the C-shaped booth at last, she set down the fresh orders of swill and gingerly, reluctantly sat down, keeping to the very edge of the ancient leather in a forlorn hope of avoiding whatever had soaked into it over the decades.

“Kill me now,” She told the person sitting there, the soft music of her voice just as perfect as the rest of her, because it, too, had been designed that way. “I'm through. I'm finished. I can't bear a single minute more of this place, or this noise, or this _smell_.” The despair behind the words _wasn't_ a result of gene-slicing, however, and the other girl glanced over at her, one eyebrow lifting fractionally.

“All that, just 'cause you had to go get drinks? The _one time_ out of every ten that I ask you to move that pretty little behind, and now you want to end it all?” Faehth snorted softly, and reached for the metallic tankard of ale that Buffee had brought back for her along with her own goblet of so-called 'wine'.

Buffee pouted; something she did so well that duels had been fought, marriages had ended, and three separate tribes of bronze-age savages had murdered themselves into extinction because of it.

“If you really loved me, you'd _never_ make me take a turn.” She peered around her, and gave a very ladylike shudder of revulsion. 

Faehth, on the other hand, merely shrugged. 

“I've been in plenty worse places; at least this one doesn't have puddles of piss in the floor... well, not many big ones, anyway.”

The dark-haired girl drank half of her ale down in one go, then lay back, resting her head against the stone wall behind her and stretching her long legs out beneath the table. She looked indecently relaxed like that, and annoyingly indifferent to Buffee's continuing existential despair. The blonde glared at her, still sitting so as to touch as little of the seat and table as possible.

“We've been here for hours, and those chem-dealers _still_ haven't shown up!” She checked her little perscomp's screen, looking for a message that stubbornly refused to appear. She fidgeted, her small, soft hands fluttering over her hair and ribbons, reassuring herself that everything was still in place. Likewise, the folds of her dress were carefully arranged, with what remained of her jewelry gleaming and chiming softly underneath the raucous sound of the house band.

Looking around once again, she searched for any sign of their contact, lovely eyes scanning the crowd again and again, trying to make Aisaak appear through sheer force of will.

“We need that job, Faehth,” She said to the other, her soft voice full of very real worry now. “We are _so_ broke, and I don't have much left to sell.”

Faeth's eyes had been closed; she looked ready to nod off right there, with one arm wrapped loosely around her cut-down blaster carbine, sheathed broadsword and coiled-up baldric that were too awkward to wear while sitting in a booth. Now she opened one eye, regarding Buffee patiently.

“They'll show, babe. They need some muscle to keep an eye on things if they're going to make a deal here. Even with Jabba getting his cut, and swearing to keep the Imperials out of it, there are still enough little fish hungry for a taste of things that they'll pay us to stand watch.”

She paused, and opened both eyes, her serious gaze the color of dark honey.

“Speakin' of Jabba... you _know_ you shouldn't have taken that loan from him. It's a _bad_ idea, letting a Hutt get his hooks into you. Not if you had any pretties at all left to sell. And _especially_ not when we're already in deep with Cyris.” 

Buffee bent her head, pretending to inspect her nail polish for chips or blemishes.

“I know.” She sighed then, the hopelessness threatening again to overtake her. “It still wouldn't have been enough. I can't live on scraps and garbage, like you can.”

The other girl looked over at her, and though her voice was soft and affectionate, Faehth's expression was troubled.

“Babe, I know you're used to soft livin' and you love soft, pretty things, but spendin' almost three thousand credits on food in only five weeks is--”

The blonde shook her head in firm denial.

“I can't; I _can't_ eat that reprocessed yeast stuff that's in all the basic rations here--it tastes like animal dung _smells_. And the 'meat' that they sell in the market is even worse; you had to take care of me for two days, remember? I was so sick from just a bite of it that I thought I was going to die.”

Faehth sighed.

“I remember.” She contemplated her mug of ale darkly. “An' you need the special, filtered water to drink, and special bedding and sheets on the bed--”

Buffee hung her head. When she heard it out loud like that it did sound like she was being awful, but she _wasn't_ lying about her needs, or trying to make her lover's life more difficult.

“I _tried_ to sleep on that Bantha-wool mattress,” She murmured sullenly. “You _saw_ what it did to me.”

The dark-haired girl winced at the hurt tone.

“I know. And the meds it took to get your skin to calm down afterwards ended up costing us more than the better mattress would have.”

Her brows knitted together as she drew lines on the table with drops of condensation from her drink.

“It's just that we're losing ground, here. We're payin' both Cyris _and_ the Hutt now, and what jobs we get don't pay enough to cover the interest they're chargin'; not when we have to pay rent on a room and buy food, too.” She used both hands to rake the wild masses of brown/black hair back from her face, exhaling her breath in a huff of frustration.

“The next payment to Jabba comes due day after tomorrow, and we don't have it. Even if we sold all the baubles and bangles you have left, we don't have it, and that's not even counting the thing with Cyris.”

Buffee shuddered again, this time with real feeling.

“I don't want to talk about Cyris.”

She was behind in her payments to the small-time criminal, and unfortunately, the man had made it very clear that there _was_ a way for her to work off her debt to him. A very _personal_ way.

Faehth was looking at her, those dark, soft eyes showing only compassion.

“He came by this morning and asked again. I told him the answer was still no.”

The noblewoman nodded with angry emphasis.

“The answer will _always_ be 'no'.” With hands that trembled with brittle anger, she stroked the intricate blonde plaits that that were threaded through the rest of her loosely flowing hair. “I will never, _ever_ be so low or desperate that I let _scum_ like that lay one _finger_ on me!”

An Ithorian and two humans approached their secluded booth, making as if to sit at the small table directly adjacent. Faehth extended one leg, barring the Hammerhead's path as she smiled up at the blank-faced alien. 

“Sorry, we're having a private conversation here; d'ya mind?”

One of the humans glared and started to object, his eyes going from her face, to her cleavage, and then to the weapons on the seat beside her. Seeing the way she was fondling the well-worn hilt of a large and very functional-looking broadsword, and noting the way her smile was tinged with anticipation, he seemed to reconsider.

“Fine, no problem,” He muttered, and the three of them made for a table further away.

Looking back at Buffee, she ran her hands up and down the sword's grip, finally drawing it a centimeter or two to make sure it was loose in the sheath before setting it back in the seat.

“Don't worry; if Cyris--or Jabba--tries to lay a hand on you, I'll take it off at the elbow and feed it to him.”

Buffee nearly gagged.

“Oh gods, _Jabba?_ There's an image I didn't need.”

Faehth propped her elbow on the table and her chin in her hand.

“Yeah, but you need to be careful. I've seen the old slug watchin' you whenever we're at his palace.” She stared off into space for a moment, then scrunched her eyes tightly closed. “Fuck, even I couldn't handle what he puts his 'dancing girls' through. And if he gets off on doing that to _them_... well, no fem on this world is half as fine or pretty as you.”

The little blonde found that she was now nauseous, on top of being depressed.

“Faehth, if you're trying to make me feel better, it _isn't_ working.”

The other girl winced. 

“Sorry.” She straightened then, and twisted, reaching over. “Come here, pretty princess.” Buffee felt those slim, strong hands take careful hold of her waist, and then she was being lifted; smoothly, without visible effort, up and over and down, till she was sitting sideways in Faehth's lap, with one of the girl's arms curled around her back, supporting her, while the other hand was free to begin lightly stroking the length of smooth leg that the high-slitted dress left bare.

Faehth smiled down at her.

“There. No icky seat, or table, or floor to worry about, just me. And I took a shower yesterday, so don't wrinkle up that cute little nose at me.”

Buffee looked up at her and sighed again, but this time it was with something like contentment.

“No complaints,” She told her. “This is better.” She lay her head against the girl's chest, those full breasts serving quite nicely as a pillow. “This is muchly much better.”

She closed her eyes as those arms loosely encircled her, their massive strength carefully controlled. 

Among the shadowy denizens of Mos Eisley, it was common knowledge that Faehth was very, very strong.

With the sole exception of Buffee, no one knew _why_. 

Gentle fingers trailed along her hip, and up and down her thigh and calf, which caused her to make a few soft sounds, and begin squirming on Faehth's lap.

“That. Keep doing that, I like that.”

Even with her eyes closed, she was sure the other girl smiled.

“I like _doin'_ that,” She whispered softly into Buffee's ear, and for one full reprise of the band's stupid, screeching song, and half of another, they didn't say anything. Their booth was in the furthest corner, and the dimness hid them almost completely, unless someone were to walk over and stand right in front of them. She trusted Faehth to let her know if that happened.

She trusted Faehth completely, with _everything_ , and for a lost little rich girl who found herself without money or a home, that was the most precious thing imaginable.

Faehth adored her with those strong, skilled hands, teasing, tending and pleasing her, and doing just exactly what she liked until Buffee whimpered softly, finally shuddering through a glorious climax, and then a trailing series of smaller ones that left her floating on an ocean of sparkling light... before going limp and melting into the girl's embrace. Opening her eyes, she reached up and traced Faehth's lips with her fingertips.

“That was lovely. You take such good care of me.”

That got her a brilliant white smile.

“Yeah, well; I've noticed that if you go more than a couple of hours without somebody spoiling you, you start to sulk.” She leaned down and kissed Buffee once, then twice. “We can't have you being sulky,” She whispered, and then they were kissing again, this time at great length.

When the kiss ended, Buffee spent a few moments just luxuriating in the tiny, brief moment of contentment that could happen even in such a place as this, before reaching out to retrieve her goblet of wine. It was awful enough to bring her most of the way back to grim reality, but unfortunately one couldn't ignore the universe forever, no matter how attractive that might seem.

Faehth was watching her closely, and seemed to see her mood shift. Leaning back once more, she rested her head against the wall behind the booth, her eyes on the girl in her lap. She played idly with a lock of the soft, pale-blonde hair that was twined all about with tiny pink and white ribbons.

“You know Jabba's wondering why your family has that bounty on you.” Faehth's voice was quiet, to keep anyone from overhearing, although with the band still playing endless variations on what seemed to be the only song they knew, it was unlikely anyone would hear anything. “The only reason he _hasn't_ pulled you in to be one of his slavegirls is because he doesn't want to scare off anyone who might know if you took something valuable with you when they threw you out.”

Buffee wavered between wanting to frown and wanting to purr, caught between the opposing stimuli of the unpleasant subject matter and the sensual little tickles generated by Faith toying with her hair.

“They didn't throw me out; I left.”

Faehth looked down, watching her hand as she twined the hair around and around her fingers, then let it slither free in a spill of silken-soft gold.

“Yeah, but you _did_ take something. You took their very favoritest thing; that shiny little trinket we have hidden away. The one that they want back really, really bad.”

Buffee reached out and took some of _Faehth's_ hair between her delicate little fingers and gave it a less-than-gentle yank.

“I'm not giving that 'trinket' back,” She told the other girl, her voice as low as she could force the sound of lovely soprano bells to go. “I don't care _how_ many bounty hunters Daddy sends, I'm never letting him take it back.” 

She wouldn't speak plainer than that, not when there was some chance that someone here _would_ overhear them, noise or no noise. Faehth winced at the hair-pulling, but made no move to rescue her long, dark locks.

“I'm not saying you should. We just need some kind of plan, and pretty soon, otherwise bad things are going to start happening.” She checked the tiny chrono built into a plain silver ring she wore on one finger. “Shit. You're right, it's been too long. Those dealers would have been here by now if they were gonna show at all.” She slumped where she lay sprawled, and at 190 centimeters tall, one of her sprawls took up a lot of space. “We're screwed. We'll never get enough credits together to pay what's coming due. The Hutt is going to pull you into his palace, and put you in a chain and collar, and in a few day's you'll be begging him to go and get our little--”

Buffee yanked at that handful of wild, dark mane she held, and Faehth fell silent.

“I'll think of something,” The blonde assured her. “After all, I come up with brilliant plans all the time.” She smiled, doing everything she could do to hide the hollow, swiftly-expanding core of fear inside her. “I'm genetically perfect, which is _way_ more than just looking pretty, right?”

“Uh huh.” A pause, then the tall girl smirked at her. “It's weird, though, how a 'perfect' woman is allergic to around three hundred different kinds of food... and unfiltered water... and dirt... and her own sweat.”

Faehth's outfit left several inches of her flat midriff bare, and Buffee delivered a sharp poke with one long-nailed finger (careful not to poke too hard, lest she break the nail--a set of very dense abs lurked beneath that smooth skin).

“Quiet, you giant barbarian creature. A noblewoman never sweats; it isn't ladylike.”

The tall girl grinned, then went on:

“You _are_ perfect at puttin' on all that makeup, and woof! Where would we be without _that_ survival skill to get us though the bad times, huh?”

“Shush, I said.”

Though of course she then had to take out her small mirror and check to see if the layers of cosmetics that fashion and custom required of a noble lady were properly in place.

Faehth, unfortunately, was still going strong:

“--An I never knew that being perfect meant taking a bath, a shower, and _another_ bath every single day, even when we're on a planet that's nothing but one big _desert_. So just you smelling nice costs us close to four hundred credits a week because that fucking Hutt found out that you _have_ to have your--”

Buffee froze in place, staring fixedly at one of the tables about twelve meters away, and Faehth went suddenly quiet.

Then: “What is it?”

Buffee looked at her for several seconds, mind working furiously, then she smiled.

“I see a way out.”

The tall girl looked at her, eyebrows raised, and casually, without undue fuss, turned her head to glance idly at the table across the way. When she turned back, her pretty face was drawn into a look of confusion.

“I don't get it.”

Buffee already had her perscomp out again, and was flipping through the directory of stored contacts. Finding the one she wanted, she spent just a few moments entering a few lines of text before sending the message on its way.

When she looked at Faehth again, she felt her spirits lifting in anticipation of the reply.

“That farmboy over there, and the old man; I saw them both at the bar earlier.”

The other girl looked at her askance.

“Okay, so?”

“Sooo... they're talking to Solo, and his tame Yakkak beast.” Yakkaks were native to one of the more useless continents owned by her family, a place of high mountains and twenty-meter snowfalls, with the huge and highly dangerous creatures making settlement in the few suitable valleys a nearly suicidal proposition.

Faehth shrugged.

“Like I said; 'So'?”

Buffee leaned close, pulling the other girl's head down till their foreheads touched, so that they were looking at each other from just centimeters apart.

“You know those things I'm good at, besides looking like this? Well, one of them is being able to plug into the local gossip,and sorting out the what from the other what. And just a few hours ago, I heard that when Solo and his walking hairball landed last night, it was _without_ their shipment.”

Her lover thought this over for a long few seconds.

“That doesn't have to mean they're done. Jabba knows that sooner or later everyone gets boarded, and has to dump a cargo. He'll just charge it against their next few runs till they make it good.”

The blonde smiled what she knew to be an evil little smile.

“That's just it. This is the second time they've dumped their load in their last five runs.”

Those honey-tinted eyes widened.

“Oh.”

“ _And_.... They're already in to Jabba for some trouble they had with his people on Dulac; another eleven thousand credits' worth.”

Faehth's mouth was hanging open just a little now.

“Ohhhh _shit!_ ”

“Exactly.”

She pulled her head back, and did another little 'look without really looking' glance over at the other table, then wriggled around a tiny bit in the other girl's lap.

“I heard the old man at the bar, when I was getting our drinks. Him and the boy are looking for transport out of the system.” She assumed an overly-thoughtful pose, tapping at the pouting fullness of her lower lip with one long nail. “Now, I wonder why Solo might be interested in hiring a charter that gets him out of here in a hurry....”

Faehth gave her a sidelong look as she lifted her mug of ale and drained what remained.

“Looks like they made the deal,” She noted, as the boy and the old man slipped hastily away, just in time to avoid a half-squad of Stormtroopers who came over to investigate, found nothing but Solo and his wookie, and proceeded to troop back across the room and out through the exit.

Buffee wasn't watching that; she had little to fear from Imperial soldiers. Her Father would never dare tell the Empire what she'd stolen from him, for to do so would only draw their wrath down upon himself as well. No, she was looking at her perscomp, which was displaying the reply to her earlier missive.

With a smile of sheer triumph, she turned the little device so that Faehth could see what was displayed there: 

_Lady Sohmerrs --I have relayed your information to Jabba, and he has asked that I convey to you his thanks, as well as a promise of 24,000 Credits, payable upon the delivery of Captain Solo, alive and not excessively damaged, to his palace. For the wookie, his companion, a further reward of 3,000 Credits is offered, so long as he is intact enough to be of suitable use in our dealings with Captain Solo._

\---Bib Fortuna

 

The girl looked at Buffee, and Buffee leaned in to kiss her lightly upon the lips.

“See? I _am_ perfect, and perfect people always find a way.”

Faehth grinned back at her, reaching over to gather up her heavy blaster and sheathed broadsword. From nearby they both overheard a carelessly-loud voice: 

“--This could really save my neck. Get back to the ship, and get her ready.”

A low caterwaul of agreement reached them, and something large and hairy loomed, and then moved away. Both of them toyed with their drinks, watching from the corners of their eyes as Solo stayed seated at his table for a critical half minute or so, tapping at a battered-looking perscomp.

Buffee glanced at her partner and spoke very softly, leaning close to be heard over the background noise.

“He's probably contacting the Portmaster; promising a bribe if he'll let their ship take off without telling Jabba's people first.”

Faehth nodded in agreement. 

“Do you want to try for the wookie, too?” The brunette didn't look wildly enthusiastic about the prospect; she was strong, not insane. Buffee shook her head, sliding off of her lap to stand for a moment, straightening her hair and dress, and taking up a folded parasol of white lace--critical protection against the twin suns of this hellish world.

“No. It isn't worth it if we have to take him alive.” She glanced to where the towering humanoid was just visible as he ducked out through the exit, and leaned in close. “I'll go and make sure he's really gone to their ship; you hold Solo here till I get back.”

“Got it.”

They trailed their hands lightly across one another's before parting ways; Buffee for the stairs up to the street, and Faehth for the nearby booth, where Solo was just moving to stand and leave.

  
* * * * *  


It required the elecronic transfer of three hundred credits to get clearance for the Falcon to launch within the next thirty minutes (without various informers being tipped off in the process), and even then Han got the feeling that going sooner rather than later was highly advisable. Closing down the little pocketcomp he rose from his seat and rounded the table, mind already engaged with planning the best departure vector to avoid the usual Imperial patrol ships, when--

“Going somewhere, Solo?”

His head snapped up, and he cursed his inattention as he saw the massive muzzle of the blaster that was aimed at his stomach. Looking beyond he weapon--a BlasTech E10a, he noted, a cut-down carbine instead of an actual pistol--he saw--

“Yes, Faehth, as a matter of fact I was just on my way to see Jabba.” A lie, but then he'd found that stating the truth rarely improved matters once blasters were drawn.

As for Faehth....

She was young, for starters; a guess would put her in her mid to late teens, not even old enough for an airspeeder license on most worlds. Wild mane of loose dark waves down her back, pale face and eyes like shadowed bronze, with full, red lips drawn back from very white teeth. She was extremely tall for a standard human woman; centimeters taller than he, with broad shoulders and full, high breasts over a narrow waist. Her hips were modest, her legs long and graceful. She was, by nearly anyone's standards, either quite pretty or verging on being a real beauty.

She was also a brutal thug, with a reputation for being able to dismember a man with her bare hands... and for _enjoying_ it. The way she held the heavy blaster, handling the weight like it was nothing, gave some credence to the rumors about her freakish strength.

Han himself had encountered her only in passing, to the degree that any two players in Tattooine's smallish criminal world might cross paths at various times without actually coming into conflict.

He'd seen her around Jabba's palace a few times, here in Mos Eisley a few more. To meet here now, however, and for her to have a gun aimed at him, suggested that maybe Jabba had been quicker on the uptake than he'd thought... and it also suggested a course to try.

“I was just meeting with some people here who owed me some money, and they came through,” He continued, hands raised slightly and a pleasant smile plastered onto his face. “I'm heading out to the Palace now to give Jabba what I owe him.”

Faehth smiled back at him, although her version was a lot less genial. She moved forward, forcing him to back up until he sat back down in his booth. She dropped down into the seat across from him, and didn't seem to notice as he scooted sideways a little before slouching against the wall.

“I'm thinkin' you probably should've paid him, or blasted out of here very first thing, instead of fucking around in _this_ place, trying to find a payin' job.” Her throaty voice was filled with satisfaction, and Han reflected that dumb muscle usually _did_ have a good laugh when a higher-level player hit hard times. “Jabba just threw a _monster_ bag of credits on the ground, all for whoever drags you back to him.” Her dark eyes narrowed, sparkling with the cruel delight of a child watching someone else's suffering. “You'd have bounty hunters coming from all over to get you, son... you know, if we hadn't found you first.”

He was doing everything he could to project casual unconcern, even going so far as to prop one leg up on the table between them, with one arm dangling loosely off the backrest of his seat. By sheer coincidence that positioning _happened_ to obscure his right arm almost completely, and he was slowly, stealthily moving it lower even as he held the girl's gaze with his own... though her mention of 'we' caused him to freeze in place for a second or two.

“Yeah,” He said aloud. “But I _have_ his money, so none of that has to happen.

_I almost forgot, she's partners with that fancy blonde; the incredibly spoiled bitch-girl noble from the Core._

That one had a nasty reputation too, and he'd seen her in the cantina earlier (it was literally impossible _not_ to notice someone who looked like that, in a place like this), but at least she wasn't here _now_. And since it was also well-known that Faehth possessed considerably less than half the brains in that particular partnership, he judged his chances of getting out of this to be fairly good... just so long as she didn't stop to think about how she couldn't see his arm was doing.

“Money?” Faehth asked, expression brightening. “Works for me; hand it over and maybe I'll forget I saw you.”

Han leaned back a little further, and just for luck he reached up with his visible hand and idly traced the irregularities of the stone wall beside his head. 

“I don't have it _with_ me.”

Just as he'd hoped, her eyes flickered up to follow the movement, and so she missed the slight, unavoidable jerk as his right hand snapped the restraining strap free from his holster.

“Tell Jabba--”

Her eyes came back to his face.

“From what I heard, Jabba's through talking to you.” She shook her head slowly from side to side, _tsking_ at him before continuing. “You dropped one too many shipments, huh? I might be just a street rat, but even I know that if somebody pays you to smuggle illegal stuff for them, you have to actually _give_ them their stuff afterwards.” 

Even with a blaster aimed at him, Han wasn't the sort to let a dirt-hugger tell him his business.

“Listen, you have no _idea_ what goes into doing what I do.”

He was easing the blaster free of its holster now, a centimeter at a time.

“It doesn't matter how fast your ship flies, not when you get boxed in by three customs corvettes that drop on you out of--”

Faehth cut him off.

“Whatever, man; try explaining all of that to Jabba.” She shrugged with an elaborate display of unconcern. “All I care about is getting paid. And hey, the slug might not even kill you. Maybe he'll just take your ship.”

Han dropped all pretense of patience with the girl, and straightened slightly, telling her straight out: 

“Over my dead body.”

The blaster was free,and he angled it carefully upwards from beneath the table, guessing at the angle needed to miss his leg. Only a few more seconds, and he would fire a blaster bolt up through the table and into that smug, pretty face.

Faith was smiling broadly, looking delighted that he'd shown some spine at last.

“ _Really?_ I heard you flew some kind of amazing, tricked-out little thing, but it's still just a space barge, and that seems like a stupid thing to get killed over.” She shrugged, and raised her weapon slightly, lining it up on his face, not realizing that her self-satisfied little smile was the last expression she would ever have. “Okay then. Don't worry, we'll just get the wookie to empty out your accounts for us, collect the half-bounty Jabba will give us for your corpse, and buy our way _off_ this sandpile. Me and my girl will be fucking each other silly while the critters are picking _your_ bones clean.”

Han smiled back, his blaster rock steady and his finger dropping to the trigger.

“Yeah, I'll _bet_ you--”

“ _Don't_.”

There was a touch at his throat, the lightest of feather-light touches as something hovered there beneath his chin... and a tiny trickle of blood spilled down his chest.

He froze, not daring even a twitch, and he saw Faehth look to her left, surprise turning to delight as she recognized the new arrival.

“Buffee!” She smirked at Han, inclining her head towards him even as she extended her oversized blaster across the table until the barrel touched his sternum. “Don't worry, babe, I got this.”

In point of fact, if Han fired now the bolt would tear through the surface of the table, sever her extended arm at the elbow, and end by detonating inside of her chest cavity... but he had a hunch that was no longer the best way to preserve his own life. Someone slid into the booth beside him, someone small and light, and he caught a whiff of faint,delicate perfume that had somehow avoided being instantly assimilated into the thick and reeking air of the cantina.

“Faehth,” The voice from beside him was disturbing; something that soft, innocent and pure should _not_ be coming from the person holding a blade to a man's throat. “You _don't_ actually have him; he was half a second from blowing you away.”

The dark-haired girl looked like she wanted to protest, and there was a stirring from the person beside Han, then something was pressing lightly against him, under the table, directly into his groin. Buffee leaned forward a little, coming into his line of sight, and her eyes were cold and hard in that delicate, painted-doll's face of hers.

“Do you know what an A21 Needler is, Mister Smuggler?”

He almost nodded, till a tiny repositioning of the blade beneath his chin made him think better of it.

“Yeah. light blaster pistol; narrow beam, low power.” He eyed her with what tatters of defiance he could manage. “Small enough for little girls to carry in their purses.”

Her smile was sweet enough to choke a Hutt.

“That's what you're feeling down there. And 'low power' is still more than enough to flash-fry something very important to you.” The mini-blaster nudged his groin a little harder. “Let's see it. Slowly.”

Han was a gambler, but part of that was recognizing a losing hand when he saw one. Carefully, moving with extreme care, he brought his blaster up and laid it on the table. Faehth's pale face went white when she saw it, and her free hand moved the weapon out of his reach before she turned to look at Buffee, her expression a mix of shock, lust, and transcendent adoration.

“Holy shit,” She breathed reverently. “You _are_ perfect. In every possible way.”

The little blonde lifted her chin and smiled, looking insufferably pleased with herself.

“I know.”

She slid out of the booth, gesturing with her knife for Han to stand as well. He touched the tiny wound at his throat, noting that the blade of the weapon she held was _pink_ ; a dainty little thing of smooth facets, with the guard and handle all in gold, intricately etched with delicate images of flowers and butterflies. The blade itself was a parajewel: a synthetic gemstone that could hold a nearly monomolecular edge. They were a bit fragile, but could cut any material except hard metal and some ceramics like they were water.

When Faehth spun him around to face the door, it was with an ease that he associated with non-humans like Chewy, and when she twisted his arm up behind his back, her grip on his wrist like a durasteel shackle, he started to wonder if he would be able to find a way out of this after all.

_Maybe someone will let Chewy know in time for him to show up and help me deal with these two._

As they moved through the crowd, and face after face either regarded him with no interest at all, or turned away in mild, awkward discomfort, he realized the futility of that hope. No one here had any reason to help. They all knew who ruled Tattooine's underworld, and had no desire to antagonize Jabba on behalf of someone who was not even a friend.

Behind him, the two girls were talking.

“The hairy monster was heading for their ship, so I came back--and a good thing I did, right?” There was a little grunt, as of someone who had been poked or lightly struck. “Sacred Stars, Faehth! You only had to do one thing; _one thing!_ ”

“Hey, he distracted me with his words, okay? And besides, _I'm_ not the one who borrowed money from a Hutt!”

The three of them ascended the steps and emerged into the brilliance of the noonday suns. Han turned to see the little blonde open a lacy white parasol, which she used to shade herself from the punishing glare. She saw him looking and twirled the sunshade, turning back and forth slightly as she regarded him flirtatiously from beneath long,thick lashes.

There was no denying that she was a stunner, though personally he'd never really liked the way women from the core felt the need to layer half a kilo of makeup on their faces. 

Faehth, seeing the direction of his gaze, pulled him around, actually lifting his feet clear of the ground for an instant along the way before propelling him before her as they headed down the street.

“Eyes front, spaceman,” She growled, her grip tightening until he thought he felt the bones in his wrist grinding together. “That's _mine_.”

He kept his feet under him, and looked back over his shoulder, eying the little noblewoman. 

The power dynamic here was plain; Buffee was the one who called the shots, the one who completely dominated in the relationship, even if she was a fragile and soft-spoken little ultrafemme, and Faehth was basically a KobaTech-77 Power Loader in skintight leather. With that in mind, he started in on his pitch.

“So, you're in deep with Jabba too, huh?” He gave the blonde his best lopsided grin, before the taller girl shoved him again, forcing him to face forward unless he wanted to sprawl headlong on the ground. Undeterred, he continued speaking, directing his words back towards her. “What kind of chance do you really think you have with him, huh? I mean long-term.” A couple hundred meters down the road he saw their destination; a vehicle garage where a bare handful of rusted speeders and sand-rollers were available for rental, provided one left a sizable deposit. Six Jawas scurried past them, each with a jingling, clanking bag of scrap metal, each of them trailing a dry, sour stink and a diffuse cloud of gnat-like insects. 

Across the way, a tired looking old man with spectacles and a beard seemed intent on herding as many dewbacks, dustrats, droids, and assorted pedestrians out into the street as possible, although once they were there he looked unsure about what to do next. It looked both absurd and pointless, and Han dragged his attention back to more important matters as he heard Buffee answer his question from behind him.

“You don't think the Hutt will let me pay off my debt?” Another quick glance back showed the pale beauty strolling along in her swirls of gossamer white lace and long golden hair, still spinning her parasol idly. Those gemstone eyes met his for an instant, as sharp as they were beautiful, reminding him that _this_ one at least had a dangerous, fully functional mind. Managing an indifferent shrug was nearly impossible with one arm twisted up behind him, so he did his best to put the gesture into his tone.

“I think for someone like you, Jabba would do almost anything to make sure you never got away from him.” He looked into the far distance. “You've seen the inside of his Palace, you know what kind of games he likes to play.” 

The whine of a passing speeder, and the harsh grinding of a rusted, obsolete droid attempting to sweep drifted sand away from a doorway nearly made him miss her soft reply: 

“I've seen.”

Neither of them could see his face, so he permitted himself a faint, cocky smile as he found his opening.

“He's a filthy old slime worm, and he has a thing for humanoid females, the more exotic the better. Turning me over to Jabba isn't your ticket out of here, sweetheart, all it's doing is delaying the inevitable. If a Hutt really wants something--like, say, a certain pretty little dolly girl--he'll always find an excuse to get it. And everybody knows Jabba's girls don't last very long once he decides it's time to play--”

There was a little muttering snarl from the tall girl forcing him along, ending with: “What I _know_ is that you should probably shut the _fuck_ up--”

Her voice stopped abruptly, and he turned his head to see that Buffee had put her hand on Faehth's arm, causing the tall, tough enforcer to close down instantly. They shared a look that was uncomfortably intimate for him to observe, and after a moment their hands clasped, and stayed that way. The smaller girl appeared deeply troubled by his words, which was all to the good. The other one was looking at him with eyes that were seething with resentment.

“She's already scared. If you keep trying to make it worse, I'm gonna rip this _off_.”

She yanked at his arm for emphasis, making him grunt with pain even as he shook his head.

“I'm not tryin' to scare her, I'm giving her a way _out_.”

The aristocratic beauty looked up, worry shifting to curiosity.

“Really? What way?”

And there it was. Han stopped, and the oversized girl glanced at her partner, got a nod, and stopped as well, shifting her grip to let him turn and fully face them.

“You're never gonna earn your way out; no matter what Jabba promises, it won't actually happen that way.” Looking from one to the other, he focused on Buffee; she was the key. “He'll end up not having enough cash on around to pay the full bounty; I've seen him pull that one before. He'll give you some, then promise the rest for later. Then he'll keep you hanging for weeks, or months, paying it out as slow as he can, while you burn money living in his town, on his sandpile. Before you know it, you'll be right back where you started... or worse.

Buffee stared up at him, slipping her hand free from Faehth's so that she could smooth a few strands of windblown hair back into place.

“And you can save me--save us--how, exactly?”

He smiled, gesturing back over his shoulder with his thumb. 

“The _Falcon_ , my ship. I've already got a charter; a quick passenger run to Alderaan. We can head there right now, and you'll be safe on a Core world before Jabba even knows you're gone.”

Faehth bared her teeth at him in something that was much more a sneer than a smile.

“Oh yeah, that would work out _great_. What we really want is even _more_ bounty hunters looking to crawl up our ass!” 

Han raised both eyebrows in a look of exaggerated surprise and contrition.

“Oh, I'm _sorry_ , I thought you were some kind of rough and tough mercenary, but if a few losers with war-surplus blasters and some body armor make you want to hide under your bed, then by all means--”

“It won't be a _few_ , you stupid fuck! It'll be _all_ of them!”

Faehth turned to look at her partner.

“You know this is garbage he's shoveling at us, right? We know the only reason the guys after us now are hanging back is because we're in with Jabba, right? Because they're worried about what he might do if they grab you?”

The tall girl was distracted, all of her attention on the noblewoman as she waited for her partner to give her direction... and Han's blaster was tucked into a pouch that hung from the bottom of the same leather baldric that held her sword, an arrangement similar to Chewbacca's bandoleer. The pistol; a powerful DL-44 model, was just a little too big to fit fully within the pouch, which left half of the hand-grip hanging out and just waiting for him to make a move.

He forced himself to look away.

_That's the longshot play; no need for that when I think I have her most majestic and magnificent highness here talked around to letting me go anyway_. He looked at the two of them again, neither of them much more than half his age, if that. _Blindsided by children, and dragged away in front of everybody like a miniature mondi-lan on a leash. Chewie's never gonna let me live this down._

“A way out....” Buffee's whisper was hardly louder than the faint sound of the desert wind as it rattled through the sullen and filthy streets of the port. She looked up at Faehth, and even Han felt something inside his chest clench for a moment as a look of dawning joy turned her eerily perfect face into a thing of incandescent beauty. “His _ship_ is our way out!”

Han nodded, glad she'd followed the trail of breadcrumbs to the choice that would keep him alive and free, but at the same time there was a little finger of uncertainty tickling the base of his spine.

“That's what I said. I'll give you free passage to Alderaan, or any stop along the way, if you'd rather try one of the smaller--”

Faehth looked confused (unsurprisingly), staring at Buffee like she was trying to find some hidden meaning in the girl's words.

“I don't... you don't mean we're really running away, do you? For real?”

The blonde smiled radiantly.

“Of course not.”

Han froze.

_Wait--'Of course not'?_

He opened his mouth to demand an explanation of that and... closed it again as he saw a squad of Stormtroopers heading their way at a determined walk. Buffee followed his gaze, and her frown was like clouds suddenly obscuring the sun. Turning away, and carefully keeping to the shade of her parasol, she gestured to Faehth, and the girl dragged Han along as they slipped into a narrower side street that intersected the main strip. 

Straining at the grip on his arm, Han managed to hang back enough to get a peek around the corner, where he saw the armored troopers had halted and were now standing by while their Sergeant spoke with a Kubaz. The non-com bent his helmet close to the robed and hooded figure, listening intently as the long-snouted humanoid relayed something and gestured towards the north-western side of the port town. 

Faehth edged forward just far enough to see past the corner too, and watched as the squad formed up and headed away at a brisk trot, weapons ready. Giving Han a rough shake (and making him lament Chewie's absence yet again), the girl looked across at Buffee.

“It's fine; it's nothing to do with us.” She cocked her head curiously at her partner. “So _what's_ the brilliant plan again? We're going to his ship but _not_ running away?”

Han stood as straight as he could manage, trying to prop up his severely battered dignity.

“Yeah, what's with that?” He cast a meaningful glance in the direction of Jabba's palace. “Seems to me your best chance of getting clear of this place is to hitch a ride.”

The girl barely spared him a glance, reserving all her attention for Faehth.

“We're not running away; that would be stupid. The best way to keep Daddy's hunters off of us _and_ keep any new ones from joining in, isn't to fly off on Mr. smooth-talker's ship... it's to _buy_ it.”

Both Han and the girl stared back at her, and said one word in perfect unison:

“ _What?_ ”

Buffee smiled a lovely, evil smile of proud delight.

“Come _on_ , it's brilliant, don't you see? Jabba's going to do whatever he's going to do to Solo, but he still has cargo that needs shipping, and now he'll have a ship sitting there with no one to fly it.” A little wave of dismissal in Han's direction left his stomach in free-fall, and he grimaced, reassessing his options as she continued. “Sure, he has lots of idiots and petty criminals sitting around who would jump at the chance, but those shipments are worth a _lot_ of money, so he'll need someone who's smarter than that riff-raff, someone who's trustworthy. Someone who's _better_.” Both of her hands did a graceful little turn, presenting her glorious and superior self.

Faehth frowned, considering.

“Wouldn't it be better to just use the reward to pay Jabba off? Then we can just hop a ship and disappear.”

Buffee shook her head. Standing in the narrower street, between the close-spaced buildings they were shaded from the twin suns, so the blonde folded her parasol up and gestured with it as she spoke.

“That only gives us a change of scenery; we'll probably have trouble finding our sort of work at the next stop, too, and the jobs we do get won't pay any better than what we were getting here.” She did her devastating little pout again, and Han scowled at the sight. “And we already know that joining up with a criminal gang would be a problem even without all that, since anything half-way human with a pair of eyes is going to make a grab for me sooner or later.”

Faehth nodded in longsuffering agreement.

“ _That's_ the godsdamned truth; I have to watch my back every fucking second around those guys, or some jealous idiot tries to knife me so they can have you.”

“Well then.” The small girl twirled her folded-up parasol around and around, then used it to gesture at Han. “How about we try something different? We do what _he_ did; run cargo for Jabba... and I suppose do whatever else you can do with a little freighter too, but mainly work for Jabba. He'll be getting a deal, because he's getting the ship for free, less whatever he has to pay someone to go and kill the wookie, I suppose. And then he 'sells' it to us, which cancels out most of the reward he promised, so he's happy he doesn't have to lay out a ton of cash, _and_ I'll still be working for him, so he can ogle me as much as he wants when we're in port.”

Faehth winced, one hand still gripping Han's wrist like a mag-sealed clamp.

“That doesn't seem like a great deal from our side.”

“Only it _is!_ We get a ship, and guaranteed work that pays lots better than groundside slogging. We won't be living here, so Jabba and Cyris and whoever else won't be able to run up our bills by charging a centi-cred for every breath of air or rent for the meter of ground we happen to be standing on.” She was so happy she was nearly dancing in her dainty little high-heeled slippers. “We'll have to work for Jabba for maybe a year or two, but then we'll have him paid off and we'll slip away, free and clear and with our own ship!”

Han's narrowed eyes were locked on her like a targeting sight, and he was hyper-aware of the distance to his blaster in Faehth's pouch.

“That's _my_ own ship, little girl.”

She beamed up at him, all sugar and ice, not even slightly intimidated by his unrelenting stare.

“Oh, I don't think it will be for long, Mr. spaceman; it'll be _mine_. And you have no idea how happy it will make me to get _off_ this gross, disgusting world!”

She looked up at Faehth and started to add something, only to stop short as someone else spoke.

“What's this? You're leaving?” Han and both girls looked to where the side street curved sharply, ten meters away. A human male was standing there, and as their eyes found him he grinned.

“Lovely Buffee, if you leave now you'll break my heart.” The grin fell from his face, turning in a heartbeat to a grim and dangerous look. “Especially since by my count you currently owe me four thousand, seven hundred and twenty-six credits.”

Three more figures moved up behind him. Faehth stiffened, and Buffee clutched tightly at her folded parasol, though her face remained as composed as that of a statue.

“Cyris. I was just about to message you.”

His eyebrows raised fractionally.

“Oh?” He strolled forward, with his henchmen close behind. Han saw that one of them was another human, a skinny young man with pockmarked skin and a nervous twitch in every motion he made. The other two were more imposing; a matched pair of Sakiyans. The tall humanoid race was widely known for their superior senses and inborn tracking and hunting abilities. With oversized craniums, pointed ears, and dark skin that shone like polished metal, they were a disconcerting sight, though Han saw that their attention was reserved entirely for Faehth, who was staring right back at the two with narrowed eyes.

Buffee nodded at the gangster, her green eyes wide and guileless as a child's.

“I was _totally_ going to get in touch, so that I could pay you what I owe.”

The man stopped directly in front of the girl, towering over her despite not being especially tall himself. 

“I heard about your good luck already, pretty doll,” He told her, and smiled just a little as her face froze for an instant. He glanced at Han, then back to her. “I have friends in Jabba's palace; I hear he's willing to pay _very_ well for this one.” Reaching out, he lightly caressed her cheek with the back of one finger. “So I think I'll take the good Captain here, and you can pay your debt to me another way.”

The little blonde, never physically imposing, seemed to shrink in on herself, her eyes filling with genuine fear and desperation. 

“You can't do that--you _can't!_ ”

The sight of the almost supernaturally-beautiful girl trembling and powerless almost made Han pity her... almost. As Cyris casually removed the sheathed para-jewel dagger on Buffy's hip and tucked it into his own belt, the twitchy young henchman moved up to stand beside Han. Looking at Faehth, he raised a cheap pistol--a semi-automatic slug thrower--and gestured at the tall girl to step back.

Faehth, who had been locked in a staring match with the two Sakiyan hunters, turned her head and looked at her lover.

“Buffee?”

The noblewoman was cringing, and trying to pull away as Cyris crushed her up against him.

“Such a little tease, dressing like that, looking like that--” He fingered the gossamer finery that drifted around her in the slight breeze that carried down the narrow street. “I'll teach you your place, and beat all of that annoying uppityness out of you....”

Faeth, who was being prodded in the midriff by the youngest thug's gun now, spoke again, more urgently.

“Buff?!”

Struggling helplessly and fighting a losing battle to keep her face away from Cyris' rough attempts to kiss her, the petite girl met her partner's eyes. Flustered and frightened as she was, Buffee drew a fragile bit of strength from that glance; reassurance that whatever happened, she wouldn't face it alone, and she found her voice once more:

“Faehth.... Take them.”

And Faehth _moved_.

  
* * * * *  


It wasn't that she was stupid, exactly.

Faehth knew that a lot of people called her slow, or dim, or outright dumb (though not to her face), and she certainly wasn't in the running for a scholarship to the Imperial Academy or anything. Over the years her tendency to act without thinking things through had gotten her in a lot of trouble and caused her a lot of pain, and she _did_ have difficulty, sometimes, when trying to deal with the shifty and deceitful crime bosses that ruled the shadier bits of the galaxy. So, when she met someone who _was_ a genius, a bright and shining star of beauty and wonder and passion and intelligence that outshone anything she'd ever known, Faehth was more than willing to let that person be the one to decide what they should do and when they should fight.

Because even though she teased the girl about her 'superiority', and her delicate nature, and her incredible self-obsession, Faehth knew that Buffee really _was_ better; not just better than her, either, but better than just about _everyone_. She wasn't sure if it was because of the gene-slicing thing, or just that the blonde was simply one of those people that happened to end up with impossible amounts of brains, beauty, charisma and luck, but whatever the source of Buffee's power the result was undeniable--Faehth had been captivated the instant they'd met, and for every instant thereafter.  
Sure, she disagreed with the girl often, and worked hard to win at least the occasional argument; she had her own pride after all, and it was important to show that she was more than just someone's pet.  
And yet, despite her stubborn insistence to everyone that she _wasn't_ stupid, or deficient, or dim (and her willingness to physically destroy anyone who disagreed too loudly), within her innermost thoughts she knew that she... benefited from a partnership with someone cleverer than herself. Someone who could navigate the complex situations, so long as Faehth was there to handle the simpler, more violent incidents.  
Then, too, there was the part where Buffee was simply the most beautiful thing that she'd ever seen, and she'd somehow seen fit to allow Faehth the honor of holding her, and adoring her, and loving her, which was infinitely more than she could ever deserve.

All of which meant, essentially, that when Buffee told her what to do, there was no room at all for doubt or hesitation; she simply acted.

The little man in front of her, with the barrel of his gun in her stomach was first--she slapped his hand away, sending the gun flying to bounce off the nearest wall, and in the same instant hooked his legs out from under him with one foot. He'd only just managed to clutch his broken wrist to his chest, mouth open as he took a breath to shout, before he crashed down hard on his back, which drove the air back out again in a gasping wheeze.

The two Sakiyan were next; already drawing weapons and lunging forward with more-than-human speed.

Faehth's other hand was already holding Solo's forearm, so she _used_ him, spinning through a windup and slinging the man sidearm at her foes, the flying human projectile prompting a strangled shout from him and grunts of surprise from the metallic-skinned aliens.

Using the bare second that the move had gained her, she ripped her broadsword from its sheath.

Yes, her half-rifle was slung from her baldric too, but she knew better than to use a blaster or slug thrower in close confines. She'd once fired a bolt into a nearby ferrocrete wall, only to have it send a spray of splinters right back at her face. She'd been bloodied in a dozen places, and only narrowly missed being blinded by the high-velocity fragments. The street she was on was bounded too tightly by walls for her to risk that, especially with her precious, vulnerable Buffee standing far too close.

Luckily the two Sakiyan felt the same way, with both of them ignoring their pistols and instead drawing paired vibroblade shortswords, which instantly woke with nasty little buzzes. They moved confidently forward; obviously skilled with their weapons and also fully aware that members of their species were on average a fair bit faster than humans,and almost twice as strong.

Faehth didn't pause or hesitate; when facing more than one enemy you had to take the fight right to them, and that's what she did. Going to her left, she met the fearsome-looking humanoid there head-on, with a looping, downward cut of her meter-long blade. It wasn't a vibroblade, and it wasn't made of anything wondrous or exotic; it was merely a length of hull metal she'd salvaged from a wrecked frigate a few years earlier, cut, shaped, smoothed and sharpened over the course of a week in a cluttered old machine shop where she'd worked while in between better jobs.

It was plain and workmanlike thing, and almost entirely lacking in grace or elegance--and when the grinning Sakiyan lifted both of his lighter blades up to catch hers in an almost lazy cross block, he was stunned to find his weapons _smashed_ down in a shower of sparks, with Faehth's strength driving her sword through the defense and several centimeters into his shoulder before his straining arms could stop the downwards cut.

Looking at her in shock, he started to speak, but his partner was leaping at her and she had no time to wait for his words. Pivoting right she fired her left leg into his middle with all her might, the kick striking with the speed and power of a maglev piston. He _flew_ backwards, eyes nearly leaving their sockets as he traveled five meters through the air before slamming into a wall and collapsing into a broken heap.

Faehth, driven back by the force of the impact, added impetus to her motion, rolling backwards across the pavement then bounding to her feet to frantically parry twice as the second Sakian furiously unleashed a flurry of cuts with his vicious, buzzing blades. Stumbling back and blocking again and again, she ignored the sparks flying from each collision as the vibro weapons chewed tiny notches in her sword's edge with every blow.

From the corner of her eye she saw Buffee struggling with the much larger Cyris, and the fact that she was unable to go to the girl's aid hurt her far more than any wound ever could.

  
* * * * *  


For the first few seconds, Cyris had looked genuinely amused. Seeing Faehth draw a sword and move to attack his two alien henchmen, he'd actually laughed, as if it were a show being staged for his entertainment. Only when Faehth either crippled or killed the first of them with just two moves did he stop, and stare in growing disbelief.

It was, after all, one thing to have heard the stories about how the tall girl was very strong. It was quite another to see her kick a ninety-kilo humanoid through the air, across the width of a _street_ , and literally feel the crunch of the resulting impact through the soles of one's feet.

Cyris was still clutching her tight, holding her against him as he dropped his hand to the butt of the electrostunner in his belt holster. That weapon was short-range,but there was no danger of a ricochet, and the electrical bolts it threw would drop even Faehth with one or two point-blank hits. 

Buffee _was_ frightened, and repulsed by the way the thug had laid hands on her this way, and very much aware that she was meant for better things than fighting, but desperate moments required desperate measures.

Her small hand fumbled at the hilt of her gemstone dagger, where it was stuffed in beside his gun holster. The position was all wrong, and the blade was binding in the sheath because of the pressure of Cyris's gut against it. The man felt her awkward reaching, looked down, and scowled at her distractedly.

“None of that now, my helpless little kitten.” He swatted her hand away, then shifted her dagger to be a little further out of easy reach. “There. Let me just settle this oversized freak of yours, and then you and I can take a little trip to Jabba's to collect my money--”

He had half-drawn his pistol, already looking towards where Faehth had found her footing and was now exchanging cuts and parries with the Sakiyan in a blurring series of clangs and sparks. He stopped, however, when Buffee stopped staring at her dagger and instead glared up at him, tapped a certain ring on her middle finger twice with the long nail of her thumb, and then clenched her tiny fist and punched him.

Responding to the coded tap, the ring morphed between one instant and the next, with more than half its mass shifting to become a finger-long needle-like spike facing outwards. Even her girlish strength was sufficient to the task when all of it was concentrated on the exceedingly fine point of that needle, and as she punched him over and over again in what parts of his chest and stomach she could reach, each childlike blow drove the full length of that needle into his flesh, organs and lungs.

He looked down at her in utter shock, but managed, barely, to catch her fist as she tried to drive it up underneath his chin. The needle punched through his palm and out the back of his hand, and he grunted in fresh pain. And yet he still stood tall and strong, clutching her against him. A dozen needle punctures will not drop a man instantly, even if a few of them _had_ struck his heart and lungs.

“You little Hutt-fucking _whore!_ ”

The arm pinning her shifted, and he grabbed a handful of her hair, pulling at it and drawing her head back painfully. He'd dropped the pistol in order to stop her fist, and he was still holding it with his other, still-impaled hand. Which meant that she was no longer being crushed against him... and that he was no longer preventing her from reaching the hilt of her dagger in his belt, and pulling it free.

He realized his mistake an instant too late; she rammed the pretty pink gemstone blade into his solar plexus, twisting it as hard as she could.

He let go of her hand and her hair, reaching down with an agonized cry to grab at her wrists, but it was too slow--part of being genetically perfect was being very, very quick; far quicker than a degenerate and lecherous thug like this one. 

She yanked her dagger free and took half a step back, neatly avoiding his now-clumsy hands, then leaned in and slashed up and across, taking him across his unguarded throat in a blurring cut that flowed into a graceful little pirouette that spun her safely out of reach as blood spurted and pulsed from the severed artery.

In spite of herself she took several moments to glance down at herself, making sure there were no red spatters on her dress, skin or hair, then she looked up and watched him collapse on the pavement.

“No,” She told his twitching body softly. “I'm not a whore; not for the Hutt and certainly not for you.”

  
* * * * *  


It took Han a minute to recover from what had happened. To be truthful, it took him some part of that time just to convince himself that what had happened was what had _actually_ happened. Sure, he lived in a galaxy with wookies and the like, but a man still didn't expect a human girl to just up and _throw_ him at someone.

_And with one arm, too--this day is getting mighty damn strange._

Once his head had cleared, he took a quick look around. The blonde girl was struggling with Cyris, flailing at him with one fist like a child throwing a tantrum. Off to the other side, the rangy, bizarrely-strong Faehth was now backing the second of the Sakiyan enforcers towards a wall, using the extra reach of her sword and the sheer power of her attacks to keep him on his heels.

Nearer at hand, the youngest of the goons, the one Faehth had first slapped down, was clutching an obviously broken wrist and staring at the growing carnage with shocked eyes.

_Having second thoughts about the criminal life, son? Well, I do too, some days._ He paused, then eased himself up off the ground and into a crouch. _On the other hand, sooner or later a patient man finally gets dealt a decent hand._

The boy's slug thrower was on the ground by the wall, but that meant nothing, because even closer lay Han's own blaster. He supposed it had fallen there while Faehth was busy fighting, and now, with both of the girls engaged, he had a few seconds to get his hands on it and finally turn this whole situation around.

  
* * * * *  


The Sakiyan was backing, and backing, and she threw everything she had at him, as hard and fast as she could, because the bald-headed, shiny-skinned, knob-chinned _fucker_ had seriously fast hands and some tricks with his blades she'd never seen before, and she was bleeding in three places from cuts where he had not _quite_ managed to kill her.

She tried to back him all the way into the wall, but he was too savvy a fighter for that and slipped left instead, backing along it. That neatly prevented her from attacking from that side, since the wall was in the way, and his defense firmed up accordingly. She pressed him back another few steps anyway, through sheer ferocity, but her attempt to make him trip on his fallen friend failed too. All he did was step over the nearly motionless form, his feet moving so surely they might have had eyeballs in them.

Faehth reached the body a moment later, and held there for a couple of seconds as something occurred to her, and then she flinched back as the Sakiyan suddenly lunged, sword-points buzzing as the vibroblades came at her--

And she gave it a try; the half-assed thing that had come to mind as she saw the fallen thug's blades lying there, still buzzing mindlessly as their internal mechanisms vibrated the blades into miniature buzzsaws. She managed--barely--to get the toe of her boot underneath one of the shortswords lying there, and flick it upwards as she stumbled back and away from the swordsman's attack.

It half-worked. The blade chewed most of the way through the leather of her boot in the instant it was in contact, but then it flew up and actually hit the Sakiyan in the face. Not hard enough to kill or maim, a vibroblade isn't a lightsaber, to cut bone like air, but it did open a long, painful gash across his cheek, forehead and eye before it clanged back to the ground. Partially-blinded, in sudden agony, and utterly distracted for that one instant, he could only manage a weak, one-handed attempt at a parry. It wasn't enough, and the point of Faehth's sword punched through the center of his face and deeply into his brain, killing him instantly.

He fell back with a clatter, and lay still on the ground, close beside his twin.

Panting a little, and very happy to be mostly in one piece, Faehth turned to Buffee... and gasped in horror as she saw Solo in a crouch, his hand closing around the blaster that must have fallen from her pouch back when she did the shoulder roll across the ground. The smuggler was looking at the blonde girl, and in that instant Faehth knew he meant to kill her. 

She screamed, hoping against hope that it would distract him for a critical few seconds as she fumbled for her slung blaster, but she knew it was too little, knew it would take far too long....

  
* * * * *  


Just as Han's hand touched his blaster he heard a shout from behind him, Faehth's hoarse voice screaming out a denial... and it didn't matter. He usually avoided killing women, when he could. It was sometimes unavoidable, though, and at that moment he felt very little in the way of remorse or doubt as he saw Buffee glance up from the dead man at her feet, see him there, and register the gun as he scooped it up--

\--And then time both slowed to a crawl _and_ flickered into fast-forward, because damn it all if the girl didn't try to out- _draw_ him, her hand flashing down to the dainty little blaster she carried in a hidden sheath on her thigh, and shockingly, she was _fast_.

Of course, Han was pretty fast himself. He didn't see himself as a gunslinger, but the first half of his adult life had been built around flying ultra high-performance spacecraft. StarFighter pilot is _not_ a profession for those with slow reflexes, and even among that elite group Han had been among the very fastest. A decade had passed since that part of his life ended, but he was still an ace pilot, and as of yet time had stolen very little of his speed.

So when he saw the girl see him, and saw her right arm explode into a blur of motion, his instinctively did the same.

  
* * * * *  


He nearly got her.

Very, _very_ nearly... but not quite.

Buffee's hand dipped through the slit in her skirt and to the flat little rounded octagon of plastic and alloy that was her needlegun, and she _just_ managed to bring it into line and get off a shot before Solo did the same. Hers skimmed the top of his forearm before slamming into his bicep, and it was only the completely involuntary spasm of those flash-burned muscles that twitched his gun away and kept his return shot from striking her in the belly. 

As it was, the overpowered bolt whined past her hip, uncomfortably close, and she gave a little scream from the sheer terror of having death pass that close.

She shot him again, in the same arm, as part of that same frightened reflex, and he fell to his knees, face drawn and cords in his neck standing out like cables from the shock and pain, his gun hand a rigid claw that only loosely held the weapon.

The smuggler gritted his teeth and tried to take the blaster in his other hand, the pain making the movements slow and fumbling, but Faehth was there, her blaster in one hand and sword in the other, raising the notched blade high for a downward stroke.

“ _No!_ ” Her frantic call made the girl check her swing halfway through its arc, and they shared a look as Buffee took a breath, and smoothed her rumpled dress with one small hand.

“No, don't. Remember, Jabba wants him alive.”

The other girl looked away, bared her teeth at Solo in a silent snarl, but then slung her blaster and ripped his away before stepping back.

Buffee nodded in relief; everything still hinged on getting the man to Jabba alive. She looked around them, noting the way the locals seemed to have vanished the moment trouble started. Cyris was unquestionably dead, and the two Sakiyan seemed unlikely to cause her any trouble either, given their bloody and motionless forms.

The young human was still alive; staring at her in utter terror, huddled against the front of a shuttered building. She walked a few steps closer, smiled at him reassuringly, and then raised her blaster and fired twice. As his body slumped, she slipped the weapon back into the holster hidden beneath her skirts, straightened her shoulders, and took a deep, cleansing breath. Since it was Mos Eisley that was mostly a symbolic gesture, and she only just kept from coughing at the pervasive stench of sun-baked manure.

“So, as I was saying... we'll be smugglers.”

Faehth, who was keeping one eye on Solo as she searched the bodies for valuables was looking more hopeful as she considered the idea.

“We can run cargo for little colony settlements too, and charge damn near any price for stuff like medicine, stuff they _have_ to get from somewhere.”

“Exactly.” Satisfied that things were more or less in order, she gestured for Faehth to help the groggy Solo to his feet. “And even if I'm not welcome at home, I still know people in the Core worlds. Some of the nobles will pay a _lot_ for shipments of certain things, things the Empire disapproves of people having... though the Republic didn't like it much either, so I've heard.”

Unfolding her parasol, she led the way back to the main street, with Faehth and Solo close behind. The other girl muttered something low and threatening to the injured man, then went on more loudly:

“Hey, by the way. If it's just you and me on this ship of his, who's gonna fly it? Because I pretty much top out at short-hop airspeeders.”

Buffee waved a soft hand airily.

“Not a problem; _I'll_ fly it.”

The silence was so heavy, even in the returning noise of the street and other people, that she had to look over to find Faehth giving her a vaguely uncertain look.

“Um. Okay, so you know I trust you, and believe in your total perfection and everything, but... you're _sure_ you can fly a spaceship?”

The noblewoman twirled her parasol and swayed her way lightly through a carefree little spin as they walked.

“Of course I can, it's _easy!_ ” She smiled at Faehth, and pursed her lips teasingly at a passing moisture farmer. “When I was a little girl I used to fly our family's yachts all the _time_ , and they were all way bigger than some little toy freighter!” She smiled fondly at the memories. “Mr. Trum, our head pilot, would sit in the co-pilot's chair and help me with it a _teeny_ bit sometimes, but it was basically completely just me flying it. Mostly.” She shrugged carelessly, too pleased to worry about boring details. 

“It'll be fine, Faehth; trust me.”

The other girl's look was adoration and resignation and more than a little sexual desire all at once as she hefted most of Solo's weight and sighed.

“Oh, I do trust you, duchess, princess, perfect eternal amazingness... I really, really do.” 

Buffee echoed her sigh, though hers was one of pleased contentment.

“Good.”

  
* * * * *  


Epilogue

“Where _is_ he?”

Luke paced the length of the passageway, from the cockpit to the common area to the boarding ramp, ducking down to peer out at the hot duracrete bowl of the docking bay. From behind him he heard the wookie grumbling worriedly as he padded back to the cockpit to check the readouts again.

Captain Solo was late. Despite the first-mate's assurances (translated by Ben) that he would arrive any minute, a considerable number of minutes had trudged slowly past, and there was till no sign. Even the usually unflappable Ben had led the droids out to the groundside communications console on the far side of the bay, under the overhang that also shielded a few ancient handtrucks and cargo sleds to assist in loading or offloading cargo. 

As Luke watched from the ramp, the old man directed Artoo to plug in to the network through the interface there. Although Mos Eisley's data web was old and poorly maintained, there was some hope that they could find out what had--

Luke blinked, and watched in confusion as Ben saw something on the tiny screen, whirled to face the broad doors that led to the street, and then ran for the ship in a pained but admirably quick lope.

“What is it?!” The young man called, as the old Jedi reached the halfway point. Then a squad of Imperial Stormtroopers burst into the docking bay and his question was answered for him.

He ducked back; he'd already been mostly concealed from view, but now he just barely peeked past the ramp hydraulics. “Artoo! Threepio! Come on!”

The droids did their best, though neither of them were exactly speedy. The troopers deployed facing the ship, covering the droids but not firing on them... until the wookie in the cockpit roared defiantly and unleashed a torrent of fire from a remotely-operated blaster cannon on the ship's underside. Stormtroopers fell, and their return fire began slapping against the freighter's hull.

Blaster rounds also hit the far less durable droids, who were fully exposed, slow moving, and very easy targets for a group of understandably furious soldiers.

Threepio took several hits at once and seemed to both shatter and explode simultaneously. Artoo survived a bit longer, absorbing several bolts and yet managing to roll on another few meters... till one of the far more powerful blasts from the wookie's remote cannon struck him, half-vaporizing his dome and barrel-like body, and flinging the remains across the floor of the bay.

“ _Artoo!_ ” 

Ignoring Luke's anguished shout, a grim-faced Ben pressed the control that raised the ramp, and hurried towards the cockpit.

Following close behind, Luke found the huge humanoid slapping angrily at controls and yowling something at deafening volume.

Ben looked at Luke worriedly.

“Chewbacca says he hit your droid by accident, but also that he has more important things to worry about than apologies.” More yowling, a few sharp gestures, and something like an anguished fit of coughing. Ben's face fell even further, and he settled himself into an empty seat, pulling the restraints into place. “The Dockmaster has been ordered to hold us here, by order of the Imperials. He's trying to take off before they--”

The rumbling of the engines spooled up into a shriek as the battered craft lifted from the ground... and from overhead there was a clattering and squealing din in reply, loud enough to hear even inside the ship. 

The docking bay was essentially a deep pit with high duracrete walls, both to contain engine blast and also to keep valuable cargo from 'wandering' off in the hands of random pedestrians. Up near the top of the walls that enclosed the pit and the ship, there was a pitch-black slot that extended the full circumference of the bay. Now, with the jerkiness and squeals of seldom-used machinery, several dozen straight lengths of taut ferrochrome cable slid from the slots, on every side, ratcheting out and forming a webwork of metal strands across the top of the bay. The amount of open air in the center of the web shrank like an iris as the cables slid out towards the middle, staying drum-tight as they did so, and the rising _Millennium Falcon_ was forced to stop and hover as the cables locked into place, the central opening now just three meters across, far too small for the ship to pass through.

The wookie snarled savagely, one hairy paw reaching back and to the side to touch a panel there. From atop the ship a heavy quad-barrel blaster fired over and over, but even those shots that hit a cable squarely only caused it to glow faintly for an instant before fading back to dull metal.

Ben shook his head.

“They're coated in superconducting material. Not as effective as a shield generator, but good enough given that they have a million tons of bedrock underneath Mos Eisley to serve as a heat sink.” He reached out and touched the wookie's shoulder. “You can't win, my friend; I'm sorry, but you'll have to surrender... and the troopers saw me in the bay.” He rose from his seat and hurried back along the passage. “Luke, come with me.”

  
* * * * *  


“No! No, I won't--” He stared at the old man, feeling something like betrayal. “I won't _hide_ while you--”

“You must. The Artoo unit was destroyed, and we've no way to reach Alderaan now.” The engine whine was finally cycling down, as Chewbacca slowly, reluctantly lowered the ship back down onto its landing gear, though he'd kept trying to blast his way out for several minutes, stopping only after an entire squadron of TIE fighters arrived and began circling high overhead, while a reinforced company of Stormtroopers had deployed around the docking bay, bringing with them an array of heavy weapons. Ben glanced aside, as if he could see them through the metal of the hull, and then back at Luke.

“I'm sorry, I'm too old to fight so many, but I can still do this much. The Imperials will take me, and probably Chewbacca, but they won't find you here; Captain Solo hid these compartments well.” He straightened, looking down to where the younger man stood chest-deep in the smuggling hold. “Stay alive, Luke; that's all you can do for now. Later... later certain options may present themselves,but for now _stay alive!_ ”

Luke looked up at him, and then down at the lightsaber he held. 

“All right. But if I can rescue you I will.” He brightened suddenly. “Maybe I can find Solo! The two of us can work together to come and rescue you, the wookie, _and_ the princess!”

The old man's smile was slight, and very sad.

“I doubt that is possible, though it speaks well of you to think so.” There came a thumping at the nearby hatch, and he looked that way before turning back. “Your fate lies along a different path than mine, Luke... but the Force will be with you. Always.”

Luke tried to find something else to say, only to be forestalled as the old man gestured with one hand, causing the thick, insulated slab of decking to slide back across the hidden compartment, forcing Luke to duck low to avoid it. As it settled into place and then locked down with a sigh of airtight seals, he sat there, alone in the dark, and wondered what horrible disaster would befall him next.

  
* * * * *  


This is only part one of an anthology series.  
Subsequent chapters will shift to other universes, and other versions of the characters in different settings. Many of these will be one-shots, but depending on reader feedback there is certainly room for a given chapter to gain a Part 2, part 3, or more.  
It's up to you to let me know if you especially like a given world. 


End file.
